A giant of archaeology, Colin Renfrew has immeasurably improved our understanding of human history. In this passionately argued work, he offers a concise summary of prehistory - human existence that predates the development of written records - while challenging the very definition of prehistory itself.

The Invaders: How Humans and Their Dogs Drove Neanderthals to Extinction

Approximately 200,000 years ago, as modern humans began to radiate out from their evolutionary birthplace in Africa, Neanderthals were already thriving in Europe - descendants of a much earlier migration of the African genus Homo. But when modern humans eventually made their way to Europe 45,000 years ago, Neanderthals suddenly vanished.

The Oldest Enigma of Humanity

Thirty thousand years ago our prehistoric ancestors painted perfect images of animals on walls of tortuous caves, most often without any light. How was this possible? Scholars and archaeologists have for centuries pored over these works of art, speculating and hoping to come away with the key to the mystery. David and Lefrre give us a new understanding of an art lost in time, revealing what had until recently remained unexplainable - the oldest enigma in humanity has been solved.

Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors

Just in the last three years a flood of new scientific findings, driven by revelations discovered in the human genome, has provided compelling new answers to many long-standing mysteries about our most ancient ancestors, the people who first evolved in Africa and then went on to colonize the whole world. Nicholas Wade weaves this host of news-making findings together for the first time into an intriguing new history of the human story before the dawn of civilization.

Across Atlantic Ice: The Origin of America's Clovis Culture

Who were the first humans to inhabit North America? According to the now familiar story, mammal hunters entered the continent some 12,000 years ago via a land bridge that spanned the Bering Sea. The presence of these early New World people was established by distinctive stone tools belonging to the Clovis culture. But are the Clovis tools Asian in origin? Drawing from original archaeological analysis, paleoclimatic research, and genetic studies, noted archaeologists Dennis J. Stanford and Bruce A. Bradley challenge the old narrative.

1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed

In 1177 B.C., marauding groups known only as the "Sea Peoples" invaded Egypt. The pharaoh’s army and navy managed to defeat them, but the victory so weakened Egypt that it soon slid into decline, as did most of the surrounding civilizations. After centuries of brilliance, the civilized world of the Bronze Age came to an abrupt and cataclysmic end. Kingdoms fell like dominoes over the course of just a few decades. No more Minoans or Mycenaeans. No more Trojans, Hittites, or Babylonians.

The Ark Before Noah: Decoding the Story of the Flood

Since the Victorian period, it has been understood that the story of Noah, iconic in the Book of Genesis, and a central motif in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, derives from a much older story that existed centuries before in ancient Babylon. But the relationship between the Babylonian and biblical traditions was shrouded in mystery. Then, in 2009, Irving Finkel, a curator at the British Museum and a world authority on ancient Mesopotamia, found himself playing detective.

The Intimate Bond: How Animals Shaped Human History

Animals, and our ever-changing relationships with them, have left an indelible mark on human history. From the dawn of our existence, animals and humans have been constantly redefining their relationships with one another, and entire civilizations have risen and fallen upon this curious bond we share with our fellow fauna.

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

One hundred thousand years ago, at least six human species inhabited the Earth. Today there is just one. Us. Homo sapiens. How did our species succeed in the battle for dominance? Why did our foraging ancestors come together to create cities and kingdoms? How did we come to believe in gods, nations, and human rights; to trust money, books, and laws; and to be enslaved by bureaucracy, timetables, and consumerism?

Neanderthal Man: In Search of Lost Genomes

A preeminent geneticist hunts the Neanderthal genome to answer the biggest question of them all: what does it mean to be human? What can we learn from the genes of our closest evolutionary relatives? Neanderthal Man tells the story of geneticist Svante Pbo’s mission to answer that question, beginning with the study of DNA in Egyptian mummies in the early 1980s and culminating in his sequencing of the Neanderthal genome in 2009.

To Explain the World: The Discovery of Modern Science

In this rich, irreverent, and compelling history, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Steven Weinberg takes us across centuries, from ancient Miletus to medieval Baghdad and Oxford, from Plato's Academy and the Museum of Alexandria to the cathedral school of Chartres and the Royal Society of London. He shows that the scientists of ancient and medieval times not only did not understand what we understand about the world--they did not understand what there is to understand or how to understand it.

The History of the Ancient World: From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome

This is the first volume in a bold new series that tells the stories of all peoples, connecting historical events from Europe to the Middle East to the far coast of China, while still giving weight to the characteristics of each country. Susan Wise Bauer provides both sweeping scope and vivid attention to the individual lives that give flesh to abstract assertions about human history. This narrative history employs the methods of "history from beneath" - literature, epic traditions, private letters, and accounts - to connect kings and leaders with the lives of those they ruled.

The Phoenicians: The History and Culture of One of the Ancient World's Most Influential Civilizations

Of all the peoples of the ancient Near East, the Phoenicians are among the most recognizable but also perhaps the least understood. The Phoenicians never built an empire like the Egyptians and Assyrians; in fact, the Phoenicians never created a unified Phoenician state. Instead, they existed as independent city-state kingdoms scattered throughout the Mediterranean region.

The Invisible History of the Human Race: How DNA and History Shape Our Identities and Our Futures

In The Invisible History of the Human Race, Christine Kenneally draws on cutting-edge research to reveal how both historical artifacts and DNA tell us where we come from and where we may be going. While some books explore our genetic inheritance and some popular television shows celebrate ancestry, this is the first book to explore how everything from DNA to emotions to names and the stories that form our lives are all part of our human legacy.

Cro-Magnon: How the Ice Age Gave Birth to the First Modern Humans

Best-selling author Brian Fagan brings early humans out of the deep freeze with his trademark mix of erudition, cutting-edge science, and vivid storytelling. Cro-Magnon reveals human society in its infancy, facing enormous environmental challenges - including a rival species of humans, the Neanderthals. For ten millennia, Cro-Magnons lived side by side with Neanderthals, an encounter that Fagan fills with drama.

The Last Lost World: Ice Ages, Human Origins, and the Invention of the Pleistocene

The Pleistocene is the epoch of geologic time closest to our own. It’s a time of ice ages, global migrations, and mass extinctions - of woolly rhinos, mammoths, giant ground sloths, and not least early species of Homo. It’s the world that created ours. But outside that environmental story there exists a parallel narrative that describes how our ideas about the Pleistocene have emerged.

Human Prehistory and the First Civilizations

Where do we come from? How did our ancestors settle this planet? How did the great historic civilizations of the world develop? How does a past so shadowy that it has to be painstakingly reconstructed from fragmentary, largely unwritten records nonetheless make us who and what we are?

These 36 lectures bring you the answers that the latest scientific and archaeological research and theorizing suggest about human origins, how populations developed, and the ways in which civilizations spread throughout the globe.

The Sea Peoples: The Mysterious Nomads Who Ushered in the Iron Age

The Sea Peoples remain as mysterious as they were influential; while the Egyptians documented their presence and the wars against them, it has never been clear exactly where the Sea Peoples originated or what compelled them to invade various parts of the region with massive numbers. Whatever the reason, the Sea Peoples posed an existential threat to the people already living in the region, as noted by an Egyptian inscription.

Why Homer Matters

Adam Nicolson sees the Iliad and the Odyssey as the foundation myths of Greek - and our - consciousness, collapsing the passage of 4,000 years and making the distant past of the Mediterranean world as immediate to us as the events of our own time.

The Parthenon Enigma

In this revolutionary book, Joan Breton Connelly challenges our most basic assumptions about the Parthenon and the ancient Athenians. Beginning with the natural environment and its rich mythic associations, she re-creates the development of the Acropolis - the Sacred Rock at the heart of the city-state - from its prehistoric origins to its Periklean glory days as a constellation of temples among which the Parthenon stood supreme.

Big Gods: How Religion Transformed Cooperation and Conflict

How did human societies scale up from small, tight-knit groups of hunter-gatherers to the large, anonymous, cooperative societies of today - even though anonymity is the enemy of cooperation? How did organized religions with "Big Gods" - the great monotheistic and polytheistic faiths - spread to colonize most minds in the world? In Big Gods, Ara Norenzayan makes the surprising and provocative argument that these fundamental puzzles about the origins of civilization are one and the same, and answer each other.

Born in Africa: The Quest for the Origins of Human Life

In Born in Africa, Martin Meredith follows the trail of discoveries about human origins made by scientists over the last hundred years, recounting their intense rivalry, personal feuds, and fierce controversies, as well as their feats of skill and endurance. The results have been momentous. Scientists have identified more than 20 species of extinct humans. They have firmly established Africa as the birthplace not only of humankind but also of modern humans.

Saxons, Vikings, and Celts: The Genetic Roots of Britain and Ireland

WASPs finally get their due in this stimulating history by one of the world's leading geneticists. Saxons, Vikings, and Celts is the most illuminating book yet to be written about the genetic history of Britain and Ireland. Through a systematic, ten-year DNA survey of more than 10,000 volunteers, Bryan Sykes has traced the true genetic makeup of British Islanders and their descendants.

The China Challenge: Shaping the Choices of a Rising Power

Many see China's rise as a threat to US leadership in Asia and beyond. Thomas J. Christensen argues instead that the real challenge lies in dissuading China from regional aggression while eliciting its global cooperation. Drawing on decades of scholarship and experience as a senior diplomat, Christensen offers a deep perspective on China's military and economic capacity. Assessing China's political outlook and strategic goals, Christensen shows how nationalism and the threat of domestic instability influence the party's decisions about regional and global affairs.

Last Ape Standing: The Seven Million-Year Story of How and Why We Survived

Why did the line of ancient humans who eventually evolved into us survive when the others were shown the evolutionary door? Chip Walter draws on new scientific discoveries to tell the fascinating tale of how our survival was linked to our ancestors being born more prematurely than others, having uniquely long and rich childhoods, evolving a new kind of mind that made us resourceful and emotionally complex; how our highly social nature increased our odds of survival; and why we became self aware in ways that no other animal seems to be.

Publisher's Summary

A giant of archaeology, Colin Renfrew has immeasurably improved our understanding of human history. In this passionately argued work, he offers a concise summary of prehistory - human existence that predates the development of written records - while challenging the very definition of prehistory itself.

Renfrew covers many topics and references the important people in the field of archaeology. I only wish Audible would feature more books of this caliber. I am very frustrated that so few books are available on this topic. The content of this book is dense and I have listened to it several times. I was so delighted to see a serious non-fiction book offered on Audible and I don't agree with the other reviewers that this book was unsuitable for audio. Apparently the other listeners were expecting lite fare such as the Idiot's Guide to Archaeology or some pop fluff a la Graham Hancock. If you seriously interested in an overview of the field, this book is for you.

This is a well researched and well buttressed discussion of what a respected specialist in his field sees as current fact in the field of human past, before the advent of what we commonly refer to as "history" (written records). He spends some considerable effort documenting how we have come to know what we do, that is, the scientific basis for what we believe we know. To compare this work to many others on the same subject, for example Wade's "Dawn of Human History", makes the latter seem like an oversimplified introduction to the subject for an adolescent. The latter is a an entertaining listen, but it stimulates more questions than it provides answers, as it jumps from seemingly scientific premises to fanciful conclusions that are clearly based on modern biases or wishful thinking. Renfrew's work suffers from the expected occasional "dryness" any scholarly work can have for the nonspecialist. But for the enthusiast who wants to know more, without having to do the original research myself, the work of listening is worth it. I am a physician, not an archeologist; but if I can discover a bit about what and who we humans are, and how came to be us, maybe I can help my patients with some of the vast weight of medical problems that plague us today; most of which are 'lifestyle" diseases (with an underlayment of genetic predisposition). The seeds of these medical problems seem to have been sown in our distant past; and maybe some of the answers will come from the study. More power to any specialist in any field who tries to elucidate the science for the rest of us who are hungry for knowledge.

I don't understand why other commenters have criticized this book as "dry," "boring," and "too academic," or found the narration "droning" or soporific. Stonehenge boring? An up-to-date (well, 2009 anyway) analysis of how it was constructed, as well as its likely purpose and meaning to the Neolithic community that built it, presented by an expert in the field?

How about a re-evaluation of the stunning cave paintings at Lascaux, and elsewhere in France, Spain, Italy, and a narrow band eastward through the Balkans to Siberia as a "localized" event that doesn't mark a new stage in human cultural evolution because it wasn't universal enough (like the development of farming that's generally accepted as marking the shift from Paleolithic to Neolithic, and which took place on a near-global basis)? And the theory that archaeologists have attached more significance to these cave paintings than was warranted simply because they were discovered early and were rendered with artistic sophistication?

I thought the book was perfectly pitched for a college-educated layperson, and that if it would be "boring" for anyone, it would be for another archaeologist, or even a grad student or upperclassman majoring in archaeology. I appreciated having my memory refreshed on the details of carbon dating, but I'm sure anyone specializing in the field would've skipped over that part as too basic.

My only suggestions are (1) Renfrew should write an update in a new Foreword or Preface incorporating the current debate relating to whether DNA analysis shows (as asserted by Svante Paabo and his team) that all modern-day humans except for sub-Saharan Africans carry small percentages of Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA in their genomes, (2) Renfrew should reconsider the global breadth of the book, which I think stretches him and the material too thin, and focus instead on Europe, the Middle East and Mesoamerica (which appear to be his areas of greatest expertise), while leaving South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Far East for others, or a later companion book, and (3) audible should include a pdf booklet containing the tables, charts, maps and/or any other graphic information that audio narration fails to cover. Otherwise, it shouldn't call this an "unabridged" edition.

As for the narration, if was nicely modulated across both pitch and emotion. If you enjoyed listening to someone like Alistair Cooke introducing Masterpiece Theatre, and don't harbor any vague political objections to Brits speaking with Received Pronunciation, then I think you'll enjoy Robert Ian MacKenzie's narration as well. I found it pretty much transparent, which is how I like my narrations (translations, too, and for that matter writing itself). A good narrator lets the text speak for itself, and doesn't gum it up by over-dramaticizing or chewing the scenery, just as the best writers (fiction or nonfiction) communicate ideas as succinctly and simply as possible, without gumming up the works with florid prose, "style" or jargon.

Overall, as a layperson who wanted to research prehistoric Britain for a project I'm working on, I learned a lot of fascinating stuff in an extremely easy and pleasant manner. The book made an excellent traveling companion on long drives, making the time pass quickly -- same with doing everything from running to stuffing the dishwasher. I'll look for other books by Colin Renfrew, and would be pleased to read anything Robert Ian MacKenzie has narrated.

The author gives a very dry text book like presentation of the topic. The book is really mostly about the archeology of the mind. A topic I find exciting. The book is not for everyone except for those with an interest in early man out of Africa and his mental development. If your not bothered by statements like understanding symbols make us human and 'X signifies Y in the context of C', you'll probably find the book interesting too.

I didn't like the narration and would suggest to speed it up to 1.25. Also, I didn't like the dry presentation of the topic.

I did like the topic and feel comfortable giving it a higher overall rating than the weighted average of the sum of its parts. I would only recommend this book for people who really like the topic.

If you've ever listened to Dennis Miller tell a joke and realized that you had no idea what he was referencing, but fount the joke mildly funny anyway, because you sort of imagined your own facts in place of the obscure reference, that is exactly what reading this book feel like. For example he has a very insightful critique of Richard Dawkins' Meme theory, without ever, even superficially, explaining what Richard Dawkins wrote about Memes, or even what a Meme is. I happened to have read Richard Dawkins, so I got that one, but most of the references I didn't get.

Googling the author strongly suggests that he is a top researcher in the field, so the impression that he's talking to other top researchers in his field, about what they should do differently in the future, may be somewhat accurate.

I think his point is something like we have assumed too much determinism in our understanding of the evolution of culture. Because specific events caused specific changes in specific instances, doesn't imply that this specific course of evolution is necessary or even probable. He seems to be advocating the need for better causal models of the interactions between ideas and cultural changes. But I have no idea how to understand the cause and affect relationship between ideas and cultural evolution in a pre-historic context. It seems that you lack direct evidence of the ideas and large statistical samples that might be used to infer the influence of specific ideas. But I don't have a Ph.D. in pre-history; maybe it's obvious if you do.

I would have enjoyed examples of successes at understanding the influence of ideas on pre-historical evolution.

Colin Renfrew is highly respected and this book pulls together a wide variety of recent research in a comprehensive whole. However, it is too detailed for most listeners. "Before the Dawn" is much better.

Between the dry, textbook style of the book and the expressionless reading, this book is better than a sleeping pill. Because I am truly interested in the subject matter, I stayed with it but the only time I could listen was during my daily commute. Otherwise, I dropped off after a couple of sentences. I think I should have read it in hard copy because then I could have skimmed the less interesting parts. I really did not need such a thorough introduction to the history of the study of Prehistory. Still, I was fascinated by the advances in scholarship since my college years.

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